In the Mind of the Shadow
by EsophagealEruption
Summary: For ComputerFreak101's Season 5. Marik and Bakura were condemned to the Shadow Realm. This fiction is a brief insight into what it might be like for them.. Rated M for slight language.


Hi~! It's me again. -waves- Well, I entered Computerfreak101's season 5 fanfiction contest...And this is my entry for that contest, based on the first round's pairing: **psychoshipping. **This was extremely difficult for me to write. Not because it's a difficult pairing, oh, that was the least of my worries. [Except for, perhaps, spelling, grammar, and mechanics...] The reason it was so hard is because it has a major spectrum of stuff to write about. A million ideas are hard to work with when the story is supposed to be a one-shot! Hehe. There was the idea called Fetish...Then there was Candy....Then there was When Idiots Attack...Then here comes along Mr. Torture...[Yup, that one was totally inspired by Helloween...] Who knows? Maybe I'll act on those later. For now...I'll stick to the poetic-ish incentives I personally thought were okay – Can You See Me?/Voices.

Enjoy~.

:]

Set primarily in the Shadow Realm.

Because...That's where they live now.

Since the Pharaoh condemned them and all.

The asterisks* indicate a shift.

:]

I don't own Yugioh. Not a bit. :(

*******

Yami Bakura frowned deeply. He could almost see something. Maybe. Here...In this realm of darkness, nothing was certain. The purple mists could reveal shapes and shadows of people he once knew, and trick him into believing their reality. He could talk to these hallucinations for hours before remembering where he was, and remembering that none of it was real. Time...The robber could not tell anymore. He may have been here for weeks, or days, or years. He couldn't remember. Time did not exist here.

Everything was just...Always. Perpetual. It was always dusk. It was always misty and purple and gray. It was always damp. It was always so cold. It was always empty.

It was maddening.

Bakura feared his sanity. He didn't want to lose his mind, because he knew there was a way out of

_[nowhere]_

this place. There was always a loophole. He knew that one day he would not be

_[always]_

alone and dejected and cold. He knew this only because you could escape

_[Hell]_

because there were memories from

_[reality]_

the past. He remembered people, and taking, and he remembered his life. He knew what he had to do to be at rest – he had to attain the Millennium Items. If only he could get out of

_[his mind]_

the Shadow Realm, all would be well. But the Realms were practically endless...And that knowledge was both a hope and a fear. The massiveness of these Realms...They took forever to search, and they repeated because this was Hell. That's what the Shadow Realm is.

The only upside, Bakura has thus concluded, is that there _is_ a way to get out. Although pessimistic and cruel to hope in personality...Even the worst have to survive, and he knew that. He knew that although he had to sacrifice his pride, he would find a way out.

Glaring and the shifting mists, he trudged onwards.

******

Yami Marik wandered blindly through the black-and-gray forest. He cursed under his breath, swearing that once he found the

_[portal]_

door to

_[the Real World]_

Malik's head, he would brutally murder the Pharaoh, the Pharaoh's host, the Pharaoh's host's friends, and any one else who got in his damned way because he was

_[lost]_

_[afraid]_

royally pissed at the man. He did not have the damned right, the pompous bastard, to make him see things that weren't even _there_ to hear the people he didn't _remember _to hear the _screams_ that he had elicited from his victims. The damned Pharaoh...

Marik pushed a limb backwards, and the tree that was both dead and alive

_[everything is DEAD everything is ALIVE everything is NOTHING everything is ALWAYS]_

cut him with the bent limb. It sliced to the _bone_ of his hand, and he shouted and recoiled in

_[fear]_

surprise. Marik growled, and jumped forward, out of the tree's field of influence. The tree flailed its razored branches, only for a moment, before giving a violent shudder and stopping. He cursed, looking at his bloodied hand. It wasn't bleeding badly, and had begun to heal, thanks to the Shadow Realm's loving, agonizing way of letting the purple haze sink into the wound and stimulate the cells to heal very, very quickly. It hurt like a _bitch_ and left the most disgusting _scars. _Marik shuddered, and stopped looking at the gruesome infliction. Watching it heal made him want to puke the

_[everything that was nothing]_

up. He crashed through the forest, when, rather abruptly, it ended. He took three steps forward -he counted, and then he turned around.

The forest was

_[there]_

gone. It was never there. It was all a lie. He was here, he was not here.

Marik screamed. He screamed at the no one. He screamed at the everyone. He just _screamed _ because it was here and it was _insane_ and he was _here_ but he was _not here_ and he didn't know and he was

_scared._

He was not supposed to be, he never was, but he is now because he is

_[ALIVE but he is DEAD and he is REAL and he is IMAGINARY]_

in the fucking Shadow Realm because of the _son-of-a-bitching-mother-fucking PHARAOH_ and Marik was going to _KILL HIM_ for doing this and -

"WHO'S THERE?" a steely voice called out from the

_[nowhere]_

mists. Marik turned, eyes wide.

"Not another mirage," he whispered to himself.

"Who's there?!" the voice called out again, and it was _closer_.

Marik shuddered because he _knew _that voice. That voice had plotted with him. Had spoken with him. Had dealt with him. Had called out his _name_ in a moment of passion. That name was the name of _Satan his fucking self_.

And Marik _knew _it.

So he stood very quietly, and very still. This

_[insanity]_

was not real, and he could not hope for it to be real, he could not wish it real, and he knew that voice.

The mist swirled ominously. Marik glared at it. He could see maybe five feet in front of him. A shadow was moving towards him. He heard the soles of feet padding against the

_[nothing]_

dirt of the

_[nowhere]_

ground beneath them. The shadow came closer, and Marik knew the outline. He knew the lithe, panther-like body _very_ well, and had known it on many occasions, and this could not be real.

The shadow stopped, then came closer.

It _was_ Bakura. He had known it. The mirage thing was Bakura this time. Dark cocoa-colored eyes, accented strongly by pale, pale skin and light purple bruising under them glared at the paling bronze Egyptian, laced with hate and uncertainty.

For a moment, all Marik could do was stare at the other man.

His hair was wild and dirty, flying around his face with a mind of his own. Marik didn't know why it was whipping around his face like that because there was

_[always wind]_

no wind blowing. His clothes were tired and torn..He was wearing something that resembled a tunic, and Marik thought he was wearing some kind of shorts. His skin was paler than the moon...The lack of sun, plus the purple haze that surrounded them made the other man ethereal in appearance. He looked tired, deflated...He looked hopeless and lost. But his eyes were so _fierce_. They were angry and he didn't know _why_ but they were.

"Marik," the Bakura-shadow said, "Are you real?"

Marik looked at him as if the man were mentally ill and told Bakura the only truth he knew.

"Everything is real.

Everything is imaginary.

Everything is alive.

Everything is dead.

Everything is nothing.

Everything is nowhere.

Everything is never.

Everything is always.

Everything is..."

Marik screamed, and held his head in pure agony. Everything _cannot _be both real and imaginary, everything cannot be never and always, everything cannot be alive and dead everything cannot be

nothing.

Marik curled himself up. Bakura knelt next to him, and sat down on the cold

_[nothing]_

ground. Marik whimpered, and screamed again, muttering his reasonings aloud.

Bakura looked at him pitifully. When you had no hope, no control..You ended up like this. He reached out, and took Marik's hand off of his face.

Marik looked at him.

The lavender eyes were wild with anger

Hate

Love

Lust.

Happiness

Distrust

Nothing

Bakura slid his hands up from Marik's hands, and shook the other man slowly, but roughly.

"You are real.

I am real.

We are real.

There is a way out.

There is always a Way Out."

Marik stared at him, incomprehensibly. Bakura stood, and pulled Marik to his feet. Marik stared at him, and he stared at Marik.

"You are real."

Bakura nodded.

"I am real."

Bakura nodded.

"There is a Way Out."

Bakura nodded.

Marik, most out of character by this point, grabbed Bakura and hugged him closely.

Bakura patted his back, and pulled away.

Tentatively, he kissed the other man on the lips. It was simply for comfort – quick and chaste and real.

"We are real," he repeated.

He grabbed Marik's forearm.

"We have to find the Way Out," he said, and pulled Marik along. Marik followed.

They faded into the mist.

***********

:] It was implied well enough? I thought it was...But I have that "wrong" tendency, hm? I'm not totally sure about that, but I'm entering it because it was implied. I kind of dislike the slight OOC-ness at the end, but if your mind cracks, you are vulnerable, for a bit... I tried to get them into character, do you think it's character enough? The part where Marik is alone...I was writing in his character, just so...That's clear. I don't normally chit-chat or write like that. :] Well, it was fun to write, and although tenuous...I'mma stop critiquing... Review, pretty, pretty please~! -loves on you-


End file.
